Why the move?

A) World Heroes is a very themed blog, and it was an assignment for a class. Not that I don’t think I wrote some kind of sort of interesting stuff here, but I’d rather have a blog that’s more just general stuff.

B) While WordPress is very nice and aesthetically pleasing, it doesn’t have all the features I want in a blog. Blogspot is clunkier and less sexy, but it can do a couple o’ things I really enjoy. Things WordPress cannot.

So, goodbye, WordPress. If anyone read this blog ever, thank you. And maybe check out Awesome Town? It could be fun.

I think like everyone who reads Junot Diaz, I liked his stuff basically right away. Which is great because as I’m sure yo you know, the stereotype with assigned readings is that they usually suck.

There’s a charisma and a sense of “realness” to Diaz’s writing that makes it acsessable and also profound. But, this post’s purpose isn’t just to talk up Junot Diaz. This is World Heroes, damn it! We talk about…well heroes. And in Drown, there is a real hero I want to talk about. And I mean he’s a real superhero type hero: No Face.

Before I started reading Drown I was talking with my friend Rex about it, and he told me something like: “Yeah, I think you’ll really like the No Face part. He’s a super hero”. And, Rex was right of course. Super Heroes are something I’ve always loved (and, if you’ve been reading my blog here, then you know that maybe too well). I think No Face’s story in Drown is both an awesome super hero story, and a successful examination of what a super hero, or any hero is.

No Face’s story begins in Drown‘s first short “Ysrael” where we hear his origin story. In “Ysrael”, No Face (Ysrael is his real name) is beat up by Junior, the story’s narrator, and Junior’s friend Rafa. No Face is beat up because of how he looks. Which is also where the name “No Face” comes from.

At a young age, Ysrael was mauled by a wild pig. It ate his face. So now, Ysreal is quite : “His left ear was a nub and you could see the thick veined slab of his tongue through a hole in his cheek. He had no lips”. He’s gross. And, that’s why he wears a mask. And a mask is really the first step to being a superhero isn’t it? They all basically wear masks (some of which are very flimsy-looking masks that somehow manage to stay on a superhero’s face no matter what happens). No Face has the “masked” part of superheroism already covered. The other major part of superheroism No Face gets down is his identity.

After he’s beat up and unmasked by Junior and Rafa, we don’t see Ysrael again until the book’s 2nd to last story “No Face”. Like most superheroes, Ysreal reinvents himself by taking on the name No Face. Like how Bruce Wayne becomes “Batman” or how Matt Murdoc becomes “Daredevil“. And, like superheroes (and this has been explored much more in the superhero movies than in the comics, actually) the name “No Face” isn’t created by Ysrael himself. It’s what other people call him to make fun of him. But, Like Iron Man in the end of the film that came out last summer (with the “I am Iron Man” line) Ysrael embraces a new identity. And, Ysareal embracing his identity as the superpowerful No Face is crucial to his heroism.

Unlike Iron Man, No Face really isn’t seen as a hero. He’s more like Spider-Man this way. Both No Face and Spider-man aren’t very popular. Actually, No Face probably the lest popular super hero of all time. Both for his hideousness and since he doesn’t save many people. But, No Face does save himself. And that’s important. In fact, that might be the whole point of this post. Beyond just the cosmetic ways he’s a superhero (mask and cool name/identity) No Face is a superhero because of how he triumphs in the face of all the adversity he faces. After all, (and this is about to be the corniest of corny) it’s what’s inside that counts. Right? I mean, plenty of villains have those “cosmetic” things I mentioned. Spider-Man’s nemesis The Green Goblin both has a name for himself and an identity, and a mask. But, he’s certainly not a hero. The Green Goblin is an insane, sadistic, murderer.

Junior and Rafa were probably not the first people to pick on Ysrael, and they definitely weren’t the last guys to. In No Face’s story in Drown, we see him being attacked again. Being bullied and attacked for his appearance is basically the norm for Ysrael. But, there is a huge difference between the bullying in the “Ysrael” story and the “No Face” story. In “No Face”, he fights back. By “No Face”, Ysrael is now a superhero. By embracing the identity of No Face, and becoming a hero, he can fight against his oppressors. Ysreal actually gains superpowers from this. No Face is incredibly strong and is able to toss attackers right off him. He’s very fast and can flee them when he has to. He can even “turn invisible”. Of course, this isn’t science fiction. None of No Face’s powers are actually superhuman. But, No Face is physically stronger, faster and smarter than the guys who try to beat him up.

Diaz’s narration for “No Face” story tells us about No Face’s powers in a very comic booky way: “He has the POWER OF STRENGTH”. And a way that suggests No Face actually does have superhuman abilities. The reason I think this is only a storytelling technique and not true superpowers is (well besides the fact that there are no other sci fi elements in Drown) that I think all that “POWER OF SPEED!” stuff is inside No Face’s head. Possibly, that stuff is showing us readers how much he believes in himself. No Face is a hero because he isn’t a victim. And, he easily could be one.

He is picked on by so many people, and he is so ugly, it would be easy for No Face to feel sorry for himself. Feeling like a victim is really a natural human reaction to being in a situation like No Face’s. I think I would feel that way. But, maybe  No Face’s true superhuman power is being able to move above that. Instead of being passive and feeling like a victim, No Face takes action and fights the guys who beat him up. And, he (to use this phrase I don’t like so much once more) believes in himself. He doesn’t give up hope.

I think every hero who exists is just like No Face in that way. When they could be a victim, they chose to actively rise up above that.

Bruce Wayne’s parents were killed right in front of him when he was a child. Like the pig eating Ysrael’s face, Bruce Wayne could’ve let that break him for the rest of his life. But instead, he becomes Batman and resolves to fight the criminals like the one who killed his parents. Daredevil was blinded by chemicals flying into his eyes at a young age. That gives him super senses besides sight. But still, young Matt Murdoc doesn’t let his blinding defeat him. He learns martial arts and puts his new supersenses to work as a hero defending Hell’s Kitchen. Maybe The Fantastic Four are the only heroes who aren’t like this. I mean, they have a pretty good deal being loved and rich and then getting powers. But actually even Ben Grim, The Thing of The Fantastic Four could have succumbed to victimization. He was turned into a hideous rock-monster and I think Ben is always trying to cope with how people view him and judge him. Which really isn’t all that different from No Face.

I think the superhero (who may not be a superhero at all. He’s not a traditional one by any means) is the DC Comics character Swamp Thing. Like No Face, Swamp Thing is ugly. And he’s a monster by no fault of his own. Swamp Thing’s a murdered scientist who is resurrected in a swamp as a gigantic moss man-monster. Also like No Face, Swamp Thing isn’t liked be many people. Just about everyone attempts to kill him because he looks so scary. But, in reality, Swamp Thing is a good guy. He is constantly protecting the innocent and using his monster strength for good. But, even after witnessing him do a heroic act, people still can’t get past his appearance. Swamp Thing could easily be victimized and defeated by how misunderstood he is, but he isn’t. He just keeps on fighting the good fight. Swamp Thing’s only real friend is probably his girlfriend (who he has sex by kind of feeding her shrooms that grow on him and making her trip out). And actually, that is a difference between them. No Face doesn’t have that sort of “special friend” in his story.

Another thing to consider is that someone attempting to overcome being a victim could easily turn into a villain. Or at least not be as heroic as all the heroes I’ve mentioned. The Marvel Comics character Deadpool is similar to  No Face, too. Deadpool is disfigured because of some form of terribly nasty cancer. He survived it by manifesting mutant powers of regeneration (and the assistance of the government expirimenting on him), but he is still quite ugly. Unlike Swamp Thing,  but like No Face, Deadpool wears a mask to cover his deformities. In fact, Deadpool is ugly all over and has to  wear a full body suit to conceeal that. But, Deadpool is not a hero. He can do heroic things, but he’s totally self-serving. And, Deadpool is completely insane. I think he has coped with his ugliness and his position in the world by essentially losing his mind. He’s very funny and always makes wisecracks. But Deadpool is not a good person. He is a sadist and really has no conscience to speak of.

This is similar to Faith from Buffy, who is similarly self-serving and cruel although not insane like Deadpool. But again, Faith and Deadpool aren’t straight-up villains. And Faith is definelty the way she is because its her method of rising up against her horrible childhood. I blogged about Faith in this earlier post, if you want to check that out. But, both Faith and Deadpool are both sort of in a gray area. They aren’t straight-up villains. But, plenty of actual villains are villains becuase they’re rising up against a sense of being victims. There are tons of examples of this, but Magento from X-Men is a really nice one. Magneto survived the holocaust when he was a child, and is very much reminded of the Nazi persecution of jews by the hatred people feel toward mutants. Unlike his friend Professor X, Magneto resorts to almost terrorist methods to stop anti-mutant acts. He even has a warped view of the world where he thinks mutants should be in control. This is opposed to  Professor X who wants equality for mutants and normal humans. There’s no doubt that Magneto is a villain. But, his reasons for villainy are because he’s rising up. He easily could have been defeated by everything he’s been through, but instead, Magneto decides to take action. Albeit badguy action.

So, what makes a hero and what makes a villain if both take action instead of being victims? I’d argue its compassion. Back to Faith (and a point I was trying to make in my “Family Business” post) she doesn’t really have a family unit, and hasn’t really learned compassion for others. This is the same with Magneto. Or Deadpool even. But, Swamp Thing feels so much compassion for other humans that he might rival the Dalai Lama. Compassion for others might be the one thing that sepparates heroes from villains. Superman is similar to Swamp Thing on this front. Superman loves planet earth. He’s so powerful that he could probably rule it (like he does in Red Son), but Superman stories constantly make the point that his compassion for us mortals is what keeps him our defender and not our conqueror.

Speaking of conquerors, (and going back to points from my “Villains” post) I think the conquistadors like Magellan chose to take over/convert the Philippines and further imperialism was his lack of compassion for non-Christians. Magellan was indoctrinated into  hardcore Christianity, hardcore imperialism, and hardcore militarism. All these things made him not really give a shit about who he killed if he didn’t like them. And it is important to note that most Europeans at the time had the same values. But, is this an excuse? Since, isn’t it up to all of us to fight that kind of ignorance no matter what time we live in? I mean, if we don’t, how will we ever move forward with anything? All the other conquistadors had the same lack of compassion but they were all so damn motivated. If they had wanted to help people instead of conquer them (like truly help them, not do what they thought was helping them) those guys would have been capable of being real heroes.

I think No Face has that kind of compassion for humanity. There is a gentleness about him. And, I think the compassion he shows for himself is important. Sure No Face beats people who try to beat him up. But, for No Face especially, the bullies and the assholes he beats up with his POWER OF STRENGTH represent him overcoming victimization. No Face isn’t defeated by everyone who hates him. He rises above it.

But, I think more so than the physical beat down he lays on bad guys, is how No Face shrugs off all the hate mentally (or maybe “spirtually”?). In an earlier story in Drown, Junior talks about how bad he feels about what he and Rafa did to Ysrael. But, in the “No Face” story, we learn that hasn’t traumatized Ysrael at all. No Face has risen above it along with all the other hate he faces. To me, the most important point of the “No Face” story is that Junior is more traumatized about what he did to No Face than No Face is.

The victim has risen above his victimization while the man who hurt him can’t. I think that’s the way it should be.

The Swine Flu has really devastated Mexico, killing almost 100 people now. It’s kind of interesting because the virus is half human virus and half pig virus. So, it’s some kind of weird hybrid. Hopefully the good people at the CDC can take care of it in this country. I think they’re doing a good job since no one’s died here. Oh well, we’ll see what will happen I guess.

It would be pretty awful if we got a big bad pandemic on our hands.

Anywho, here are some songs to listen to in the face of such a butt-nasty disease:

Since the first episode of Firefly I saw back when it was on Fox back in 2002 (which wasn’t on for long, they canceled it quite fast) I guess I’ve really “been into” Joss Whedon’s work. I think Whedon’s ability to both have huge, awesome sci fi stories and a lot of action which is actually less interesting than the characters is something I really find awesome.

And you know me: I love monsters and spaceships and martial arts fights and magic and superheroics and villainy more than the next guy.

I think with everything Joss Whedon writes (TV shows, comics, movies) he manages to pull off ridiculous action and sci fi. But, all that flashy stuff takes a sort of backseat to the characters, their issues, their inner lives and most importantly: their relationships. Where am I going with this? Well, there, actually. To relationships. And that’s the meat of this post. And, I don’t mean relationships strictly in the lovey dovey sense. Joss Whedon has some pretty sappy romance in his stuff. Buffy probably being the biggest culprit of lovey-dove. But, I guess I mean all the kinds of realationships between his characters. I think that’s really at the heart of Whedon’s storytelling. He’s very skilled at setting up relationships between characters and letting them almost drive the story. I think the major kind of relationship Whedon is interested in is family.

But, not family in really the traditional sense. Whedon’s stories tend to revolve around a main character (and generally a “hero” in the, uh, hero sense of the word. Not just the “hero=main character” way. Hopefully that made some kinda sense) and their family unit. Not a family really made up of realitives, but one that’s a group of friends that really acts like a family.

I know that’s kind of confusing.

But, allow me to explain further. This is especially true for Buffy and for Firefly. Buffy has “The Scooby Gang” which, no doubt about it, is a superhero team, but they’re also a family. A whole lot of people have written about how Buffy’s watcher Giles is a father figure for Buffy since her father is basically absent from her life. And, I have to say I agree with that. But, beyond that, Joss Whedon (and the other writers who worked on Buffy) really did a good job setting up the relationships of everyone in the Gang to make them appear like a family.

They’re Not just a bunch of kids who fight Vampires together and not just a group of friends either. Like a family, they really depend on each other and support each other. And, I think Whedon is trying to make the point that without that support, Buffy wouldn’t be the superhero that she is. Buffy is the strongest member of the team (literally: she has superstrength. But beyond that she is the hardest working of them all) but, she is the team member who needs the most support from everyone else. Typically a slayer like Buffy would work alone (well, just her and her watcher) and in secret. Buffy is unique because she has a huge family of people fighting evil with her.

And, Joss Whedon shows us  what Buffy could be like without family. We see this in her antithesis: the “bad seed” slayer, Faith. Faith really pushes people away from her and doesn’t fit in well with the Scooby Gang. In fact, Faith very quickly betrays them and becomes a villain. This is during season 3 of Buffy. And, unlike Angel, who had turned evil and been the 2nd season’s villain, Faith had a choice to become evil. And that choice is what makes Faith an interesting and complex character.

Faith really just has a kind of wonky sense of responsibility. She has superpowers, and a Slayer’s weird love of violence, but no family unit to keep her in line. Faith appears to only care about herself, and to have little trouble doing “evil” things. But, this isn’t totally true. There are moments when Faith “breaks down” (that’s a terrible phrase) and shows guilt for things she’s done. She’s not a sociopath, she’s just incredibly misguided. And, during her time as a villain working for the evil Mayor of Sunndale, I think we see just how redeemable Faith is.

Faith originally joins forces with The Mayor to essentially get on his good side and protect herself. But, the Mayor begins to treat her like his daughter more and more. He sort of dotes on her and talks to her like a sterotypical “dad” would. Calling Faith things like “young lady” and showing weird, fatherly affection for her.  And, Faith seems to really be working with him for that reason. I think that fact is important. This shows that Faith is looking for a family. I think that’s the real reason she decides to work for the Mayor and become a villain. And, the fact that she wants a family means she is human.

While Buffy is probably the best example of Whedon’s views on and portrayal of family, just about everything he’s worked on is about this. On Firefly, Malcolm Reynolds is the main character, but his fellow crew on his spaceship Serenity are a definate family unit. And, in Whedon’s work on the comic Astonishing X-Men, the team is also like a family. With X-Men, I think the idea from the franchise’s creation was to have the team of X-men behave like a family. I think in the original Uncanny X-Men by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, the X-men were definelty shown as a family group with Professor X as a sort of father figure for all of them. I think where we are now with X-Men, with so many different mutants and so many crazy sci fi things, the original focus on the team as a family has really gone by the wayside. That’s not really a bad thing, it is a comic book, after all.

In Astonishing X-Men, Joss Whedon really brought that family mentality back. How the team (Cyclops, Emma Frost, Beast, Shadowcat, Wolverine, Colussus) support each other and where they get into conflicts with each other is really explored. And again, Whedon didn’t sacrifice any action or sci fi comic book stuff for that. Whedon is able to have both worlds working together in Astonishing, which is probably why I like the series so much. The X-Men in Astonishing are, like the Scooby Gang in Buffy, moved beyond just a flat superhero team and are shown as a family unit.

What I mean by “flat superhero team” I guess is what we see in almost every team book. In general, teams of superheroes (like the Avengers or Justice League or The Authority) are just a bunch of superheroes together fighting bad guys. The realationships between the characters aren’t explored at all. I really like the idea of superhero teams (What’s not to like, right? All your favorite superheroes in one place) , and I think the best stories with them do investigate the characters on the team, and their relationships. I think  the DC comics event Identity Crisis written by Brad Meltzer and drawn by Rags Morales is a great example of this.

Identity Crisis is a story about the Justice League and the aftermath of the murder of Elastic Man’s wife, Sue Dibny. Sue was a civilian, not a superhero. And, she was murdered by a civilain, too. The series is about the investigation of Sue Dibny’s death, and how that leads to a new superhero tactic for the DC universe: brainwashing villains to punish them.

Where Identity Crisis really succeeds is in how it shows conflict between members of the Justice League since not all of them agree with the brainwashing. I know all of that makes the story sound quite ridiculous, but it really is a good examination of the Justice League and the relationships of the characters in it. Which, again, not many stories about super hero teams do. And really, I don’t understand why that is. It seems to me that a story about a group of people (super or not) should be about the group.

The comic series Runaways (originally written by Brian K. Vaughn with art by Adrian Alphona but Joss Whedon and artist Michael Ryan had a run on it. Now, Terry Moore is writing it and Humberto Ramos is drawing–and it’s not very good anymore–but I think they’ll be off the series soon and they’ll be new creators, so we’ll see what happens)  is very much a story about family.

The Runaways are teenagers who realized their parents were supervillains. In the early issues, the kids are very quickly forced to band together, and they don’t even know each other well. But, they come to be a new family after having to leave their evil ones behind. For Vaughn and Whedon’s runs writing Runaways, the series’ major focus was the kids’ relationship as a family. Especially how they looked out for each other and supported each other in a world that is essentially out to get them. The Runaways have a rough deal because villains don’t like them, and most of the Marvel universe superheroes don’t like them either (though for different reasons).For what I read of Whedon and Vaughn’s work on the series, there’s a definate sense that they’re all they have.

Moving away from Joss Whedon and from comics and superheroes and super teams, I think in reality, family has always been something I value. Both my actual family, and the families we create with people we aren’t related to. I think having strong groups of friends who are family-like is important. Maybe this is why, even though it should be sort of lame, I’ve always really liked how in hip-hop, there are so many groups. I mean, I think the Wu Tang really kicked this off, but just about everyone who raps (or makes beats) is a part of some group. And, holding it down for your group is really important in hip hop (as you’re probably aware). I think Kanye West‘s “Grammy Family” featuring MCs Consequence and John Legend is a good song that sort of celebrates this idea. He’s talking about his G.O.O.D music crew. Plus, it’s a good song. And, “Family” is in the title so, you know, that is appropriate for this post. And, it’s a DJ Khaled is song and he’s a very dumb but fun-to-laugh-at man.

Like I said, it is  be sort of lame, but I am a big fan of that sort of mentality.

In my own life, I’ve really been into establishing those types of groups of friends for some reason, even before I got into hip hop. And again, maybe that’s a bit lame. But I think it’s not a bad thing. My Dad has always tried to “raise me” with the idea that friends are very important. And, of course they are. I mean, it’s human nature to have friends. If you don’t, you could end up like Tom Hanks in that movie with the bloody soccer ball.

As Mos Def says on the song “Sunshine”: “Everybody gotta have family, y’all”. And he’s right. We do.

So, allow me to conclude this post (in an extremely “hip-hop”, and probably extremely assinine manner) shout out my friends. Word up to the Mof-Nins, The Fighting Dreamers and especially the Clan Of The Cave Bear. Bears, we’re not gonna be together much longer as the demise of our school looms on the horizon. But, let’s hold it down until then. And, here’s to the Cave Bears  remaining tight like Legos even after that.

I got to sort of meet Amiri Baraka a little over a month ago, which was neat since he’s a pretty cool guy. Although, most of the people who will read this blog were there as well, so they probably know what I’m talking about.

I don’t Amiri Baraka was as “angry” or even as “radical” as he’s talked up to be. Of course, that’s fine. He just didn’t live up to the hype. The only real reason I think I was looking forward to the real angry and radical Amriri Baraka is because he’d have a lot of political things to say.  I really expected that from of the intensity of the politics in his poetry. Maybe he was off his game that day. More likely,  it was probably too presumptuous of me to expect to hear something earth-shattering from Amiri Baraka about society (what a loaded word that: “society”) or something enlightening. Maybe there’s nothing earth-shattering  to hear anymore?

Of course, Amiri Baraka is a very wise man. He’s certainly been around for a long time, and like the people this blog is kind of about, he’s fought the good fight for his whole life. He’s been speaking out against all manner of oppressive problems: racism, imperialism, exploitation, greed…that list goes on and on. Amiri Baraka did have a lot of interesting things to say during our talk with him. But, I think one of the most interesting things he mentioned was who his heroes have been, and what it was like when a lot of them died.

Amiri Baraka mentioned the assassinations of Malcolm X, Robert Kennedy, Martin Luther King and JFK at least twice during that talk. I think for Amiri Baraka (and probably for many other people as well) that time was both incredibly upsetting and it really changed him as a person.

It seems all his emotions associated with the deaths of those men, and what their killings symbolized, has affected Amiri Baraka since then. And by affected, I don’t mean traumatized . I mean it like it was “earth-shattering” for him. I think Amiri Baraka is more angry about their deaths than anything else. But, he has also been inspiried even more to fight for what he believes in.  Amiri Baraka was a fighter for that before all those killings, but from what he said, I really got the feel a lot of his heroes dying in a row may have focused him more.

I think Psychologically, the death of a hero is definitely something that can change a person’s world. It seems to me it could either be paralyzing or it could be motivating. For Amiri Baraka it was the latter. Whatever it does to us, I think witnessing a hero die is a big deal.  I mean, I see it all the time in “the entertainment world”.

On a TV show they always advertise a big, dramatic episode with “…And someone will die!” Well, maybe they say it more eloquently than that. Maybe less. I saw that tactic most recently with House (which I just blogged about. Oh and spoiler alert, kids:) and the death of the character Dr. Lawrence Kutner.

I was watching House the week before that episode, it was the excellent episode “Locked In” featuring none other than the great Mos Def as a guest star (really you should check that episode out) and at the end I was really surprised by the “Next Time On House” thing. They just showed all the doctors making intense, emotional faces and had the announcer saying something like: “A tragedy unlike they’ve ever faced” or something like that. They were obviously saying the “Someone’s gonna die!” thing. So, as viewers we’re all thinking: “Oh shit, who? Which doctor? I hope to god it’s not 13!” You know, stuff like that. turns out (very unexpectedly) that Dr. Kutner was the one. And, there’s been a whole (slightly odd) movement online to sort of mourn his death. Check this out:

That’s a little bit freaky to me. I mean, I really liked Dr. Kutner, and I like House a lot, but there are all these online memorials to him. It’s been a hero death I think. Well, sort of. Anyway, this stuff  is bizarre. It’s almost making it seem like Kal Penn‘s dead or something. He’s not, he just went to work for Obama. But, you probably know that.

That’s just one example of a “hero death” in fiction, and the effect its had on people. And, its really not a great one. There have been two particularly interesting ones in comics recently. Yes, I’m talking about Batman and Captain America.

Captain America’s death was in April 2007, in his series: issue #25. And since then, Ed Brubaker (Who’s by far one of the greatest comic writers) will be known as “the man who killed Captain America”. The art on that was handled by Steve Epting so Brubaker had an accomplice actaually.

Captain America was assassinated, the Red Skull, his longtime nemesis, finally got the best of him. But, Red Skull would never have been able to manipulate a sniper to kill Cap if it hadn’t been for the Marvel Universe Civil War that had just occured. That sort of set up Cap’s death.

If you’re not familiar with Civil War, it was a Marvel comics event for summer ’06 to winter ’07. And, comics events are always all about the “heroes will die!” thing. They always have been. They’re about that and: “Things won’t be the same again!” I mean, that’s why people read them. Actually, Civil War really has shaken up the Marvel Universe (well, America in the Marvel Universe anyway) to this day in the comics. Mark Millar wrote it and Steve Mcniven did the art for the event. Actually, it’s interesting Millar got to write Civil War because Brian Michael Bendis has literally written every marvel even since Avengers Dissembled. So, somehow, Millar snuck his way in there. And he brought a new style to Marvel’s events: politics.

In Civil War, the American government establish the “Superhuman Registration Act” which is (like it sounds) a sort of Patriot Act for superheroes. And, then, we get the Civil War where the heroes (and villains) fight over it. Captain America leading one side, Iron Man leading the other. What’s interesting here is what each of those guys are fighting for. That’s way more interesting than the fact that they’ve been friends and fellow Avengers like forever. What was interesting to me reading Civil War was that Captain America was fighting against the Registration Act.

I have never liked Captain America. That whole patriotic thing has never appealed to me. But, when Cap stands up against the American Government because he disagrees with the law, it got me. I guess it pulled at some kind of heartstrings or something. It got me interested in Captain America.

The reason Cap goes against Iron Man the the Registration Act is because he believes it’s totally unamerican. I liked the statement Millar was making with that. Captain America wouldn’t fight the Patriot Act. He stands for freedom, and more importantly, the constitution. That’s very interesting, and got me to like Cap. And, it’s probably the best part of Civil War. Honestly, Civil War is a failure I think. What was billed as a huge study of superheroes, and how politics affect them (sounds like Watchmen, huh?) wasn’t. It was really nothing more than a huge super-fight in New York City. And, actually how every Marvel event is now. Secret Invasion was exactly the same thing. Except instead of fighting each other, the heroes fought alien shapeshifters.

Plus, Millar had already done a very insighful and also really badass policical look at Superheroes in his run on the The Ultimates. Especially with his “Grand Theft America” arc. Ultimates might be Millar’s best work, actually. And, there was a very different, not particularly likable, but interesting Captain America in that series. I guess Mark Millar and Captain America are a good match. Anyway, Captain America loses the Civil War, and he’s taken into custody where, on his way to trial, he’s assasinated.

I was just starting to like Captain America, and they killed him. And, that’s not me bitching. I think that worked very well. Especially having Cap die after Civil War. His death was very surprising. I think Millar and Brubaker (they probably planned it together, comic guys love to do that) killed Cap like that intentionally. In Civil War, Millar brought a lot of the less conservative comic readers onto Cap’s side, and then Ed Brubaker killed him off.

That tactic is used by Joss Whedon frequently. He gets viewers to really like a supporting character, and then has them die. Or turn evil. That’s the whole “leaf on the wind” moment from his film Serenity:

We really get to liking Wash, especially for his strange, not very philosophical, but still somehow moving “I’m a leaf on the wind, watch how I soar” lines. Then, he gets impaled. But, back to comics.

Captain America’s death was even in the news. But, I don’t think it was as mourned as Kutner’s, which is actually strange. Comics don’t really make the news much, a really big, really symbolic superhero has to die for that to happen.

Batman’s death was in the news, too. He died more recently, just a couple months ago, at the end of Final Crisis written by Grant Morrison and drawn by a bunch of artists (J.G Jones, Carlos Pacheco, Doug Mahnke, Christian Alamy and Marco Rudy). Like Civil War, Final Crisis was an event. The heroes have to save earth which has been totally brainwashed by the evil Darkseid and his mind controlling math equation. And like Captain America’s death, Batman’s didn’t happen where expected. Morrison wrote for Batman since 2007, and his final arc on that series (although he’ll probably come back to it soon) was called “Batman R.I.P“.

However, Batman did not die in “R.I.P”. He survived all manner of crazo stuff like being addicted to heroin and having his sense of identity fucked with and being buried alive. But then in Final Crisis, he (like a trooper) takes a full-on blast from Darkseid’s Omega Beams (they can kill anything, even Superman) so he can shoot Darksied, mortally wounding him for Superman to finish the job. And, after a lot more stuff, Superman does. That’s Final Crisis in an extreme nutshell becuase a ton of things happen in it. Like usual, Grant Morrison pulls off a ridiculously complex and ambitious story.

Although, there are some people out there on the vast internet who didn’t like Final Crisis, I am a fan. It’s not Morrison’s best work, but it’s certainly the best comics “event” I’ve read. Waaaaay better than the total butt series Secret Invasion. And, it’s funny because I really haven’t seen that much hate on Secret Invasion even though it was awful. Interesting…

Maybe people dislike Crisis because of Batman’s death? With the awesome Dark Knight having just come out last summer, and with it a plethora of other Batman stuff seeping into the atmosphere, I think Batman has been on everyone’s mind now more than ever. He has really been embraced as a great hero. I never thought Captain America was that loved until his death. Batman, though, I knew his death would shake up people because he was so much in the public eye recently.

I have always loved Batman ever since the Animated Series back in the 90s. Although his death didn’t really “shake me up” I thought it was kind of cool. Especially how Grant Morrison shows us Superman’s grief at Batman’s death. In a very epic (almost truly epic: like mythologyish) moment, Superman unleashes his emotion about his friend Batman’s death on Darksied. And, he saves us all.

Batman’s death was more epic than Captain America’s, but I think both work. Captain America’s death wasn’t in battle, and wasn’t honorable at all. And, Cap was a soldier and a superhero who really believed in honor, so that’s interesting. It really deflates the character and makes him more human. And of course, Captain America’s actions during the Civil War humanize him also.

Batman’s death is very different. It is with honor, and it’s the way you’d expect a superhero to go. Saving the planet, basically. But, I think that works, too. Batman is already a very human character, and one who’s flaws we get to see all the time. And, lest we forget, Bruce Wayne is just a normal guy who’s worked very very hard to get where he is. Batman Begins really shows us the hustle that guy went through to become Batman, and to become a hero. So, a pretty human superhero gets an epic super-death. And, the first guy who mourns him is Superman.

Actually, that shot of Superman holding the dead (and kind of grossly dead) Batman, is the first shot we see of Batman’s corpse. So, Superman is mourning Batman’s death with us. With the readers. That’s very good work on Grant Morrison’s part I think.

One thing to remember is that both Batman and Captain America will return to the comics. And, not just some other guy calling himself Batman or Captain America. The real Batman (Bruce Wayne) and the real Captain America (Steve Rodgers) will return from the dead. Somehow. Trust me, they will. Because, unlike reality (and as the saying goes): “No one stays dead in comics”.

Actually, I usually feel that way. But especially so when the people around me start getting picked off by the germs. I think I’m both fascinated and terrified by sicknesses. I always have been. I don’t know when it started. Maybe with the constant bouts of strep throat and ear infections I had as a kid. Or maybe it was reading The Hot Zone in 7th grade.  That book was summer reading for going into 7th grade English. It is scary as all hell. The Hot Zone‘s a nonfiction book by Richard Preston about two particularly nasty viruses: Ebola and The Marburg Virus. There are some seriously graphic accounts of people “bleeding out” from Ebola. Bleeding gore out of all their orifices.

Anyway, maybe it wasn’t The Hot Zone that created my  obsession with disease and the fear and the “cool in a gross way” fascination I have with sicknesses. Maybe there’s no explanation. I am, however, afraid of  every sickness. From the common cold to Ebola. I’m afraid if I succumb to, say, whatever respiratory my next door neighbor has, it will be no normal cold or flu. No, it’ll be my luck to get the Bird Flu or something like that. And, I would suffer horribly then die.

Diseases are scary and  interesting to me because they’re sort of the ultimate evil. They don’t think, they’re unlike any other things we face.  They will rip through our bodies, doing awful things to it, all to replicate their species. How bizarre is that?  To me, that’s really creepy  and almost unnatural. Like an HP Lovecraft monster. Something totally alien and totally evil. Of course, viruses and bacteria that make us sick aren’t alien. They’ve been a part of life on Earth (and a constant danger to us) for as long as there’s been an Earth. But, still, when you think about them, they’re bizarre.  And, It’s no wonder that many villains and monsters in science fiction are based on diseases. The Borg from Star Trek are a good example of that. I mean, they’re a race of cyborgs who come through and put robot parts on their victims, conquering their minds and turning them into more Borg. The Borg don’t think like we do. They have no sense of a conscience. They just kill, maim  and defile peoples’ bodies and make more of their kind.

And, of course, we’ve got the “modern zombie movie” where its no longer weird planetary alignments or voodoo making zombies, it’s a viral outbreak. For example, Danny Boyle’s film 28 Days Later is one of my favorite movies, and I think my favorite zombie  movie, too. And the Resident Evil videogames (as you probably know, there are movies for that, too, but they suck quite hard) and Robert Kirkman & comic series The Walking Dead. I love all of those.  You know the deal: You get bit by a zombie, you’re infected. The zombie disease (“T-Virus” or “Rage” virus or whatever it’s called in your particular zombie story) kills you and mutates you into a monster. And rarely in these zombie stories, is there a cure.

And, of course, there are tons of “Virus Disaster Stories” (I just made that term up I think) like The Stand by Steven King Or Michael Chriton‘s  Andromeda Strain. And, more recently,  the really bad movie Doomsday written and directed by Neil Marshall.

Even on current episodes of 24, Jack Bauer has succumbed to a bioweapon and is dying. Jack Bauer, who has (and can) survive just about everything, is being defeated by a virus. Of course, he’ll survive thiswith the magic of stem cells. But, in real life, we don’t have miracle cures like they’ll use to save Bauer.

Diseases are very difficult for us humans to fight. We can’t see them without a microscope.  We can make vaccines or we can develop antibiotics, but, a lot of diseases can adapt and overcome those. And, of course, for many diseases (the really bad ones especially) like Marburg or Ebola, there are no cures. Spooky, right? Well, to me, that really is.

Like The First Evil from Buffy, diseases aren’t a typical enemy. We can’t just run and and beat the shit out of them. It takes very different tactics to fight them. And I think humans are wired more to gun in guns blazing  and to beat up evil.

Granted, it’s not like older times when there really were no defenses against disease (you know, back when for medicine they had bloodletting and other really bad ideas), but still I think we’re still quite vulnerable to disease. I really do think diseases are a villain and an enemy of all humankind. And, I think it takes a special kind of hero to go against them.

Okay, that last  there might be too much of a big plug for doctors. But, I like doctors. Not all doctors are heroes, but I do think they do a really necessary job. In my book, someone who knows how to fight the diseases I’m terrified of, and (most importantly, in my case) can tell you: “You’re going to be fine” is real cool. And, I’ll admit my respect for doctors, and high opinion is probably influenced by TV. Well, by House in particular.

I really dislike most of the “Medical Dramas” that are always on TV. I feel like they’re all too much “drama” and too little “medical”. And generally the “drama” is melodrama. Or uninteresting relationship issues between the doctors (Scrubs is especially that way, although it’s not a “drama” so that’s probably ok). House is really the only show of this genre I’ve ever gotten into. That’s because on House, I the “Medical” actually comes before the “drama”. And, I think the drama isn’t overdone like it is in other medical shows. And, most importantly, the show doesn’t dumb down (or just totally ignore as some of these medical shows do) the medical parts. They say everything. And, as a viewer I generally have no idea what they’re talking about. But, somehow watching House and his team diagonse a mystery disease is interesting. I think not dumbing down any of the medical language actually helps that. And, the CGI (even though the graphics aren’t too high quality) animations of what nasty things diseases are doing to peoples’ bodies are gross, but awesome. Those are especailly cool and sort of painful to watch. And the characters make the show interesting, too. Dr. House being the most interesting of all of them, of course.

House, and maybe my family doctor, are really the only “heroes” I know  who fight the villains of disease. I think just about every other “hero” fights against evil humans or human-made problems. But, disease is an unhuman opponent. A freaky, weird menace that we’ll probably never beat. Doctors and others who fight disease are probably locked in an endless struggle with it. I doubt there is a way to make us all disease-free unless we go into a Ghost In The Shell sort of future and have mostly robotic bodies (but, that sort of future comes with its own problems). And, outside of TV I don’t think doctors get as much credit for fighting this fight as they should. Well, they certainly don’t get as much credit as guys fighting wars or fighitng fires or crime.

And, all those fights are important, too. No doubt. But I still think doctors aren’t talked about as heroes nearly as much as they should be. That said I don’t have any doctor I’d like to celebrate or reference here. But I do think it’s important to recognize that the battle against disease is a legit one. People battling diseases are working for the good of everyone. Because, after all, no human one wants to bleed out all over the place.

Like a lot of people, I’ve always been interested in mythology. Probably because of the monsters and the gods, and cool magic weapons and the sex (there’s a lot of that in most mythologies). What’s not to like, right? I also really like huge storylines, that exist in complicated, almost living universes. I mean, that’s a major reason I’m into comics, and why I like to follow TV shows, too. I mean, from Saturday morning cartoons to Buffy The Vampire Slayer to 24. The mythologies of just about every oldschool culture I’m aware of (or more importantly care about) certainly exist in those kind of universes. I mean, maybe we wouldn’t have TV shows without the world’s of mythology as a precedent. And, a lot of people say comics are a sort of “modern mythology”.

My High School experience really fueled my interest in mythology, too. The Academy At Charlemont, is very much into teaching “the classics”. I remember doing a lot of stuff  on Greek Mythology especially.

And, I had this Yoga teacher in an afterschool Yoga thing back in High School who also helped me get my mythology fix. In my Senior year, at the end of our Yoga classes, this guy would have “storytime”. Yes, I was a senior in High School, I was 18 years old and I got Storytime. It was awesome. For that whole spring, after every Yoga class, he told us a bit of the Mahabharata. If you who don’t know, that’s one of the two big Indian epics, the other is the Ramayana. The Mahabharata really is an “epic”, it’s a gigantic story in the massive universe that is Indian Mythology. And, like I said earlier, I’m a big fan of that kind of thing. So, it was pretty amazing to hear it every day after Yoga.

Side Note: Actually, Grant Morrison, a comic writer hero of mine is working with Virgin Comics and writing an animated version of the Mahabharata called MBX. I’m not sure how faithful to the actual myth it will be, it might be a lot different. It definitely looks like it will have SCI FI elements.

But, You know, I think most importantly in High School, I got introduced to the bizarre mythology that is Tibetan Buddhism. Tibetan Buddhism may have some of the freakiest looking gods of any mythology. And, what’s even stranger is that the scarier a god looks, the better the chance there is that he’s a good guy.

In High School, my friend Nicholas Taupier’s dad  was a huge Tibetan Buddhist. And for some time I had had an interest in Buddhism in general. Whenever I was hanging out at Nicholas’ house, I’d talk to his dad and get another bit of knowledge on Tibetan Buddhism. I remember one day he told me about Manjusri. Manjusri is a Bodhisattva I particularly like because he’s a real bad ass warrior. He actually has two forms, and they both fight that good old fight. Manjusri’s first form isn’t as weird and scary-looking as most Tibetan gods. He’s kind of a pretty boy:

But, don’t let that fool you. Check out the dude’s flaming sword. Flaming swords are pretty badass, right? I mean, Azrael, the one-time sort-of-replacement Batman in the 90s comics (who has come back into the current Batman comics, actually during all this Battle For The Cowl insanity) is a real badass, too. And Azrael also wields a flaming sword. But, unlike Azazel, Manjusri doesn’t fight criminals and supervillains. Or maybe he does. Maybe Manjusri fights the biggest, baddest supervillain of all time: Ignorance.

Manjusri’s flaming sword cuts through ignorance, not the bodies of bad guys. Ignorance that gets in the way of enlightenment. Or, more importantly, ignorance that makes us suffer. That, of course, is a major belief in Buddism in general, not just the Tibetan variety.

The idea in Buddhism is that we suffer because we fail to see the world as it really is. We get distracted. We get distracted by our desires for material or other forms of external happiness things or negative emotions (anger, fear, greed..). The fact is (at least the way I see it) outside the ideas of Buddhism, ignorance is seriously dangerous.

I’m about to sound like Yoda a bit, but ignorance, a lack of understanding, causes hate, causes war, violence, oppression. Or, on a more personal level or maybe more psychological level, it can lead us to depression or frustration. When we’re ignorant about the world and our place in it, we don’t understand how to be happy with who we are and where we’re at.

Of course, we can make ourselves ignorant, too. When we chose to deny something, to ignore it because it’s hurtful, it’s actually hurting us more than if we chose to confront it and learn to understand it. To go back to Buddhism, that’s a big way we can “suffer”.

And, the less we understand about things, the more stuck we are. The more stagnant our lives become. I think education is really the only way we can better ourselves. My dad is actually responsible for giving me that idea. He has always stressed how important it is for me and for my Sister to get a good education. My dad values education so much that he worked two jobs, running on only 3 hours of sleep a night to put my Sister and me through school. He still hustles hard for our education. And, I really appreciate that. That’s probably why I value education like my dad. And, why I think Manjusri is such a cool guy. Because Manjusri fights the antithesis of education.

And, it makes sense that being educated, being wise, and understanding what’s actually going on is empowering. I mean, why else would governments work hard to keep their people from getting too smart? Really bad governments, like Pol Pot’s regime certainly tried to deal with educated people so he could oppress the country. I mean, Pol Pot was crazy, but he still understood his real enemy was education. He was out of his mind, he he thought the only educated people in Cambodia were people with glasses. But, still, when he massacred them, he was using ignorance as a weapon against dissent from his people.

But, not only “crazy” regimes use ignorance as a tool to maintain power. Here in America, education is rarely a high priority for federal spending. We especially saw a lot of ignorance-mongering during the last 8 years. So many people have written about this, but here’s me doing it, too. The terror alert levels and propaganda being spread about “the enemy”, the “axis of evil”. That was a deliberate attempt to spread fear, hate and ignorance. The Bush administration did a lot of criminal things, and with a good amount of this country stupified, they got away with them. I mean, a lot of Bush’s cronies are actually wanted for crimes in Europe. If these guys travel to Europe, they could be arrested right away. I really hope that Obama will prosecute some of these criminals here in America because what they did was unforgivable. But, the are getting away with it because they’ve used ignorance to cover it up.

Manjusri’s duty is to cut through all those sorts of illusions. The ignorance that (whether created by others, or ourselves, or both) holds us back from progressing. I suppose he exists as a Bodhisattva to inspire us with his cool, bad ass flaming sword to defeat ignorance in our lives. To slice through bullshit, basically. Just like how heroes like Batman and Azrael might inspire us to defend what’s dear to us or to confront evil we see. In fact, Batman uses ignornace as a weapon. But, not like Pol Pot did. Batman turns the ignorance of his enemies against them.Christopher Nolan’s excellent movie Batman Begins really explores that side of Batman. Batman turns his enemies’ fear and hate (again, those are products of ignorance) against them by being an embodiment of it.

This is a very different approach to how Manjusri defeats his villain. Manjusri just cuts it up with his firesword. That’s much more straight-up to me. But, actually, Manjusri’s second form: Yamantaka uses similar tactics to Batman. Yamantaka is not a pretty boy in the slightest. He’s one of those “freaky-looking” Tibetan gods:

Batman dresses like he does and fights like a ninja in order to scare the badguys. But, Yamantaka is way scarier than Batman ever could be. But, never fear, Yamantaka’s  a good guy. And, the villain  Yamantaka has to fight isn’t as easily spooked as Gotham City villains. Yamantaka fights death. That’s what his name means in Tibetan: Death-Destroyer. Many Tibetan deities like Yamantaka have scary forms to fight death, but Yamantaka fights death in a special way. He fights both phyiscal death (which is how he’s immortal) but also he fights a more spiritual death. Yamantaka fights the sort of stagnation we can get into by holding on too tightly to things.  Yamantaka fights the really tough form of ignorance: our belief systems.

Yamantaka busts up personal belief systems that are causing us to suffer. Belief systems that make us hateful or depressed or afraid or otherwise unhappy. When we’re unhappy like this, it’s a real bummer, and Buddhists think it keeps us from enlightenment. Whether we’ll become “enlightened” or not, it’s good to not be unhappy.  Right? After all, life is very short. We can’t kill our physical deaths like Yamantaka can. But, we can defeat our spiritual deaths.

If we’re suffering, behaving the same way over and over and not getting happy, (and Buddhists think we all are, all the time) then we are a sort of ” walking dead” aren’t we? I guess Yamantaka inspires us to be scarier than what scares us.

To go in and defeat beliefs systems that have made us the walking dead. Defeating this kind of ignorance is very hard.This takes more than just a pretty boy with a sword which is why, like Goku going Super-Sayain 3 to fight Buu in Dragonball Z, or Iron Man donning the Hulkbuster armor to fight, well the Hulk,  Manjusri has to transform into a tougher form to take these deep-rooted beliefs out.

I guess because I value education so much, and I think Ignorance is real bad, and (more importantly) because I like flaming swords and monsters, I’ve been interested in Manjusri and Yamantaka since I first heard about them. And, I think, like the superheroes I’ve always loved, Manjusri and Yamantaka fight for us: the innocent. They defend us from evil, in a way. But, unlike superheroes, we can’t be passive and just let them swoop in to save us.

Appropriatly, we have to learn from Manjusri and Yamantaka. We have to fight ignornace like they do, but we have to fight it ourselves.

While I don’t consider myself a Buddhist, I do find a lot of Buddhist ideas interesting. I think it is always important to examine the ways we think and coming to a better understanding of that. It’s why I’m very interested in psychology, too. And, in many ways, Buddhism is a form of psychology. Sometimes it has cool gods and monsters attached to it, like how it is in Tibet. I think examining how we think is really at the core of Buddhism. And it’s probably the first step in fighting ignorance like Manjusri and Yamantaka do.

]]> http://worldheroes.wordpress.com/2009/04/14/not-bliss/feed/ 2 nickvogt manjushri 10 manjusri-kaal2 azrael yoda c1621batman-begins-posters 160-320-640 three http://worldheroes.wordpress.com/2009/04/11/you-can-watch-it-all-on-tv/ http://worldheroes.wordpress.com/2009/04/11/you-can-watch-it-all-on-tv/#comments Sat, 11 Apr 2009 23:01:35 +0000 nickvogt http://worldheroes.wordpress.com/?p=90 ]]>

Michael Silverblatt, host of the NPR radio show Bookworm, was once so moved by Walt Whitman’s poetry, he read it out loud for 5 hours. That’s both amazing and very strange. I myself have never been affected like that by anything I’ve read. Granted, Michael Silverblatt is sort of a drama king, and he also loves reading probably more than anyone else. But still, looking back on everything I’ve read in my life, I can’t say anything has me moved to action. But, watching Saturday morning cartoons definitely did.

Like a lot of little kids, I watched Saturday morning cartoons religiously. I say religiously because it was almost like a weird spiritual experience for me. I would get totally immersed into the story and the action in these cartoons. During the commercial breaks I would have to run around the room in circles because watching this stuff had seriously energized me. I really wanted to leave the room and “play” as my Mom ended up naming it. But I to stop myself. I had to wait and watch all of my shows first.
Fox Saturday mornings had the best shows from around 1992 to 2002. Once ABC lost Sonic The Hedgehog, and CBS lost Bump In The Night and Ninja Turtles, Fox was the place to be.

The classics: Batman The Animated Series, X-Men, Spider-Man, Power Rangers, Big Bad Beetle Borgs, Goosebumps, The Tick, Masked Rider, Sam & Max: Freelance Police, Mystic Knights Of Tir Na-Nog, Digimon, Beast Wars/Beast Machines, Flint The Time Detective, and Big Guy & Rusty The Boy Robot to name a few.  Yes, sir, that’s 10 years of quality Saturday AM cartoons. See, during those years, Fox had so many good shows licensed that they had a solid run from 9 AM to Noon. And, I would watch that entire run. That was all the TV I’d watch for the week. My parents didn’t let me have videogames until ’99, so this was my major stimulation I guess. At 12, Football would come on, and I’d turn off the TV. I’d leave the room with a head full of stories and colors and monsters and space ships and superheroes and adventure, energy, and I’d go “Play”.
“Playing” was me taking all this energy and doing something with it. I would run around and act out stories I created. These were generally amalgam stories, taking bits and pieces of all the cartoons I had just watched, and then books I had read and basing characters off of . I mean, I acted everything out. Every character’s part. I did every sound effect and many different voices. I was both the villain and the hero in the fights. I had many different series, and I would do my own Saturday morning cartoon run of an episode of each. I had tons of plots in my head. Again, these were all sort of ripped off of what I had watched. And still today, I come up with stories that way. I read once that Quetin Tarantino is like this. They call him a “collage” filmmaker. Maybe that’s why I like his films so much. Well, except Death Proof, but I can hate on that in another piece of writing.
The first time I did this “Playing” was when we lived at my grandparents. My dad was away a lot. He worked most of the time, fixing planes for the Air Force. For most of my life, my Dad’s been away a lot of the time, working for the Air Force. Basically, I was just living with my Mom and my two Grandparents. I remember watching Fox one Saturday morning. It must have been 1994. I remember watching X-Men The Animated Series and Spider-Man. See, my Saturday morning obsession was also what brought about my comic book obsession and interest in heroes and villains many years later. I can remember the episodes of both shows clearly. I think there was an episode of Power Rangers on, too, but I can’t recall what happened on it.
On X-Men, our heroes were beamed up to another by Mojo, an intergalactic reality show host (this idea was pretty ahead of it’s time: Survivor, what I consider the start of the current reality show craze first aired in 2000). Mojo is a disgusting creature, he’s a giant fat slug kind of guy who is so obese he needs robot spider legs to move around. Mojo has a device that can somehow create situations and he teleports you into them. He makes Rogue and Beast fight aliens in space, he makes Cyclops and Storm do a Miami Vice style cops action thing, and Jean Grae has to fight a bunch of robots in a city. Aliens watch this reality show to see if the X-Men can make it out of these situations alive. Of course, they want to see the X-men die. But, the X-men don’t, and they escape. They make it back home, and Mojo attacks them there for screwing up his ratings. For some reason, they fight him in The Savage Land, which is an island on earth in the Marvel comics world where dinosaurs still exist (and there’s a whole lot of other weird stuff there, too). Needless to say, they beat Mojo, but we know he’ll be back…

“Mojoverse” Part 1.

Part 2

And Part 3

The episode of Spider-Man was the start of the “Venom Saga”. Venom is a symbiote, an alien species that bounds itself to you, and makes you a monster, basically. The symbiote gets on a space shuttle headed back to earth, and attacks the astronauts on it. This causes the shuttle to really go off course and head for New York City. It crashes into the Brooklyn Bridge, and Spider-Man rushes to the scene. He manages to save the astronauts and get them out of the ship, but the Venom symbiote (which now looks like just harmless black sludge) gets all over Spidey. That night, he has a dream that a big sludge monster eats him, and when he wakes up, the Venom Symbiote has bonded with him. It turns into a black costume for spider-man, and makes him a jerk to everyone, but a lot stronger and able to shape-shift (which is a superpower I’ve always wanted, by the way.)

“The Alien Costume” Part 1

“Alien Costume” Part 2

When the cartoons ended that Saturday morning, I was really amped up. I ran into my Grandparents’ living room and starting acting out my own story. I ran around barefoot on the fuzzy, red carpet floor for hours. Constantly going back and forth past my Grandfather’s statue of Cortez, my Grandmother’s collection of ceramic elephants and navigating around the furniture. I didn’t see any of these things, though. What I saw was my story:

New York City. Four kids, I don’t remember what I called them then, but I’ll name them right now: Aaron, Valerie, Sam and Eddie. Valerie’s dad, we’ll call him Dr. Battler, is a scientist who invents all kinds of cool gadgets.
Anyway, we open and Eddie and Sam. They’re running from bullies. The pretty harmless kind of bullies that were all over TV in the 90s. And we hide in the dumpster. The bullies leave us alone, but Eddie and I find something interesting in there: a weird black rock.
Aaron is hanging out with Valerie, these kids are teenagers, they’re in 8th grade. Aaron and Valerie are probably going out most likely. She’s showing him all her dad’s cool inventions. Eddie and Sam show up over with the black rock and show it to them like: “Hey, check this out! A weird rock!” Dr. Battler walks in. He’s got his white labcoat on and is wearing safety goggles up on top of his head, and he has eyeglasses on. He says:
“Darn it, Liz, I told you not to come down here and mess with my inventions!” You have to say “Darn”. It’s TV for kids, after all. Then Battler sees the rock Evan’s holding. He says, “Woah. Where’d you find that?”
“In the dumpster,” I say. Liz’s dad walks over.
“It’s cool, right?” Says Evan.
“Hmm.” He says. “Can I see that for a moment?” Liz’s Dad picks up the rock. He inspects it. “I think this is from space.”
“Really?” We all say at once.
“Yeah.” He says. “This might be dangerous. I’m glad you brought it here, guys. I want to run some tests on it…”
The kids go upstairs, to the kitchen. They forage around in the cabinets, trying to find snacks. Dr. Battler is down in the basement, in his lab. His lab is in the basement. Her dad has placed the weird rock underneath what resembles a giant heatlamp. He puts on his safety goggles and pushes a big, red button. The heat-lamp device beams a multi-colored lazer down onto the rock. Dr. Battler walks over to a computer has and starts reading a whole bunch of data that’s being displayed on it. After a moment, the computer starts to freak out, and so do the lights in the lab. The rock starts to glow and then to emit a huge, black energy field throughout the entire lab. Suddenly, the rock transforms into a giant black goo monster and it grabs Liz’s dad by the throat. Dr. Battler’s struggling with the goo monster, he’s screaming at the top of his lungs.
The kids upstairs hear this and they run down to the lab. The black goo monster I holding Liz’s Dad up and yelling in some kind of ancient language. The energy in the lab has changed, it’s a maelstrom of purple electricity surrounding the monster, getting brighter and brighter. Then, it gets so bright, it’s just a giant flash.
The next thing the kids know they’re standing in the jungle. The goo monster and Liz’s dad are nowhere to be found. They’re back In prehistoric times. Or maybe a time even farther back than that. In later episodes we’ll find out the goo monster has been to Earth before, and he’s taken them back to then.
For now, though, we’re at the cliff-hanger, and we’re supposed to be like: “Woah!” What’s gonna happen now?”

We used to play Explorers.
I remember walking along the rock wall in my friend Luke’s backyard. In Cummington Massachusetts, everybody’s yard has these walls behind them. The walls are very old. I think they’re from early colonial times. In New England we have a lot of  ancient stuff like that. Especially in the “Hilltowns” like Cummington. The Hilltowns are what people in Western Massachusetts call the country. We also call it “The Woods”. Well, those of us who don’t live in The Woods call it that. I grew up there, but I live in the more urban parts of Western Mass now. I’m starting to call The Hilltowns “The Woods” more and more. It’s not all that developed up in the Hilltowns. Old colonial stuff is pretty conspicuous. Especially the weird rock walls.
They’re only 3 feet high, so I’m not sure what good they would do to keep anything out. Maybe they’re symbolic. Here’s my oldschool colonial impression: “Neighbor, this is my property. Stay you out. And God Bless”. That’s what the walls were supposed to mean. They would have to say “God Bless” at the end because they were all puritans back then. Some people in the Hilltowns still are. A whole lot of them are and don’t say they are.
Luke’s wall was an especially big one. You could walk on top of it all the way up it into the woods behind his house. It was like walking on a really mini Great Wall of China. I think it was late afternoon, and we were going into the woods like we did a lot when we hung out. I’ve known Luke since Kindergarten and we were in 3rd grade then. He was one of the few friends I had in Elementary school. We both lived on the same street and would hang out most days. We’d usually go to the woods and run around, pretending to be different things. Today, we would pretend to be explorers.
“So, I’ll be Magellan. Who will you be?” Luke asked me.

“Ummmm…” I had to think about this. Which explorer did I want to be? We were studying explorers in school. Our history book had a whole chapter of all the great explorers from back in the day. Starting with Marco Polo and going through all the big ones. You know, Columbus, Cortez, Cook, Pizarro, Ponce De Leon. Most of them were white men who went to a country and enslaved people and/or raped them and/or killed them, took gold and colonized. Yep, those guys.  But, Luke and I (and I guess our whole class) didn’t know this about the explorers a.k.a conquistadors we were studying. To us, they were like heroes. Our 3rd grade history book told us all about how great these explorers were. How they had adventures and fought in cool battles. We even celebrate Columbus’ birthday, so he must be a hero, right? Just like Martin Luther King?
“Well, Columbus is off limits. Just so you know.” Said Luke. It’s true; it would be unfair of me to be Columbus. He was the ultimate explorer. He discovered America, after all. And he had three cool boats. What other Explorers had 3 boats that were named? It was like he had 3 Batmobiles. Or 3 Millennium Falcons. Most heroes only have one cool vehicle. And we don’t celebrate Batman Day or Han Solo Day. Playing Columbus would be akin to playing god.

“And, Evan’s already taken Cortez. So you can’t be him.” Evan is another friend of mine who wasn’t there that day. Luke and Evan had played Explorers one day without me. And he had taken Ferdinand Cortez I guess. This was news to me. I thought today would be the very first game of Explorers. Oh well.

“Hm.” I looked up at Luke. “I guess I’ll be Drake.”

Sir Francis Drake was a British explorer and also an Admiral in the Navy in the late 1500s. Spain and England didn’t like each other much then. They were the two major imperial forces in Europe, and they just kept on locking horns. A lot of what Drake did was raids on Spanish ships, basically like a pirate. In fact, there’s a book about Drake by a man named Harry Kelsey called The Queen’s Pirate. In it, Kelsey says this about one of the raids: “Drake and his men lay in wait…picking off a dozen or so riverboats…the amount of loot was so massive that the pirates could not carry it away in their own ships” (Kelsey 48). Drake took a lot from Spain, and Spain hated him for it.

Of course, Francis was an explorer, too. He was the first Englishman to sail around the entire world. When he did that, he actually landed on the West Coast of America, probably near what’s now San Francisco. They don’t know for sure, but if he did land there, what’s funny about that is he called wherever he landed Nova Albion. It means New England, in Latin: “Drake claimed the land for England, marked his claim with an engraved brass plate, and that very same brass plate was found near San Francisco” (Kelsey 188-89) So, somehow New England switched from the West Coast to the East Coast. Probably because the English didn’t stay on the West Coast for long. But, originally, “New England” was the Bay Area.
Drake’s real “hero moment” was when he beat the Spanish Armada. Spain and England eventually got to hating each other so much, that they went to all-out war. Now, the thing is, Spain had a much bigger Navy than England. I mean, it must’ve been big. England didn’t get to call their Navy something badass like “Armada”. But, Drake beat the big bad Armada in a pretty awesome way.

He set unmanned ships on fire and sent them straight at Armada ships: “Vessels packed with combustibles, and their guns loaded, ready to fire when the flames reached the touchhole…In something approaching panic, the Spanish Ships simply cut their mooring lines and sailed off. They accomplished their purpose” (Kelsey 333). This victory was a big deal, too, because it really solidified England as a power in the world. And, that allowed England to become the major imperialist force it was.
Luke and I thought Drake was a hero, but like I said, he wasn’t really a good guy.

What our history books didn’t tell us was that he was a slave trader. Drake and his cousin John were actually instrumental in starting up the slave trade. Slaves were being traded at the time, but these two really kicked it into gear as a business. In the 1560s, Francis and John would go to Africa and raid villages, destroying stuff and kidnapping people they could sell as slaves: “ For Hawkins and his partners the main consideration seemed to be profit…Forty ducadoes per slave, and the costs in Africa were low…the slaves were crammed into the holds of the ships…sanitation simply did not exist” (Kelsey 16). This was a business that not many people were doing at the time, but it was hugely successful for Drake and his Cousin. They were some of the first guys to kidnap and sell slaves.

***
“I have seen no natives, Magellan.” I said.
“Aye, Sir.” Said Luke, “But there might be some. They could be hidden! We should be alert! They might be waiting to do an ambush on us.”
“Well, if they do, I have my trusty sword. It was a gift. From the Queen. It can cut through a Dragon’s thick scales!” I said.
“That’s nothing!” Said Luke, “I have two pistols that were given to me by the Emperor Fu Manchu. You know, the Chinese, they invented fireworks. They made me two pistols that shoot fireworks so strong they could blow up a tank.”
This place is so strange, Lu—Magellan.” I said. I decided to change the subject. I hadn’t intended to start a weapons race with my sword line. “The woods, they’re not like anything I’ve seen on all my vast travels.” We had seen all these woods before, but never through the eyes of Sir Francis Drake and Ferdinand Magellan. And, like the rock wall, I was exploring the ground with my feet, too. I was barefoot. I had left my shoes in Luke’s house. I really don’t like wearing shoes, and I was even more adamant about this back then. That day I had decided to go up into the woods without shoes on. This was partially a conscious decision I made. And, partially because I was just so excited to play explorers I forgot to put shoes on. We were running out the back door of his house, through the playroom. Past the ping-pong table where Luke would always beat me at ping pong, and he stopped. Luke had noticed my barefeet. He said:
“Nick, do you want to put shoes on?” And I looked down at my feet, then back up at Luke. I shrugged. I was starting to think I shouldn’t have done that shrug, because the forest ground was a lot spikier than I had anticipated. But, there was no turning back now. We were explorers in this strange new place. Two old adventurers on a mission. Sir Francis Drake would never complain about hurting feet. Especially not in front of Magellan. They were both brave soldiers and heroes.
Actually, Magellan and Drake never knew each other. Magellan died in 1521. And that was 20 years before Drake was even born. That fact didn’t matter to us at the time.
***

Magellan was the first ever European to sail around the entire world. So, Drake would probably look up to him. Magellan was Portuguese, but he worked for the Spanish government. They hired him to sail to Indonesia in the early 1500s because they wanted to set up trading. According to Webchron, a history database run by Dr. David Koeller, a history professor at North Park university in Chicago: “Magellan convinced the king that this voyage would be useful to show that the Spice Islands were property of Spain… King Charles I saw this as an opportunity to gain status and wealth for his country and gave Magellan his funding” Magellan is credited for circumnavigating the world, but in reality, it was his boat that did it, not him. Magellan’s journey stopped with his death in the Philippines.
For some reason, when Magellan got to the Philippines, he really felt the need to convert the country to Christianity. He was able to convert a lot of people in the Cebu region of the Philippines, but he came up against some serious resistance when he tried converting the nearby island Mactan. Lapu-Lapu, the king of Mactan, strongly resisted conversion. In the book The Life of Ferdinand Magellan, and the First Circumnavigation of the Globe, Francis Henry Hill Guillemard says Lapu-Lapu: “Was defiant enough [he said] ‘If the Spaniards had lances then so also did they. Reeds and stakes hardened by fire’. They were ready for them” (Guillemard 248). So, Mactan would stand up to Magellan and his crew.
The Magellan guys, armed to the teeth, went in and started busting up the place. They actually burnt down civilian houses: “The captain-general sent some men to burn their houses in order to terrify them” (Guillemard 250). But, this battle did not work out so well for Ferdinand. He got shot by a poison arrow, and then when he was weak, Lapu-Lapu’s guys (for lack of a better phrase) stabbed the shit out of him: “One of them wounded him on the left leg with a large cutlass…they rushed upon him with iron and bamboo spears” (Guillemard 251). And, with Magellan’s death, that was the end of the battle.

Lapu-Lapu is regarded as a hero in the Philippines, but we weren’t taught anything about him in 3rd grade. We were basically taught that Magellan was massacred by crazy natives. I don’t know if they were crazy or not, but it seems to me like they were in the right that day. They were just defending their home. Magellan and his whole band of outsiders just came in trying to force a weird religion on them, and when they didn’t accept him, he fought dirty against them and burned their houses down. I’m with the Philippines on this one.
***
When we found the Brain-Sucker, Luke and I didn’t have to stay in character to act like it was new to us. It wasn’t just new to Ferdinand and Sir Francis. It was something Luke and Nick hadn’t encountered before. There was a thunderstorm since we were last up in Luke’s wood. The wind had knocked down some of the smaller trees, split some in half. The bigger trees were strong enough to resist the storm, and had only lost some branches. I was trying pretty damn hard not to step on these, but it wasn’t easy. Fallen branches were all over the ground and were not being nice to my feet.
“Woah! Look at that tree, Drake!”
“Which tree?” My eyes darted around the woods for a moment, and then I found it. The biggest tree that the storm had wrecked. It was dark black and gnarly. I didn’t know it at the time, but thinking back (and applying 11th grade Environmental Science knowledge) this tree was probably old and dead before the storm even took it out. The wind had had split the tree in half, the entire middle was splintered. There was a stump, and right behind it, lying on the ground was the top of the tree. One giant spike stuck out of the top of the tree.

“No,” Said Luke, “That is no tree. I was wrong. It’s a Brain-Sucker!”

“Huh?”
Luke sat down on the stump and leaned his head back a bit. The spike coming out the downed top of the tree poked the back of his head a bit. “See,” said Luke, “You put your victims in the chair here, and then the needle,” Luke patted the spike behind him that was jabbing his head. “The needle goes into their brain. Then, you pull this lever…” Luke put his other hand on one of the tree’s big roots that was sticking straight up out of the ground. “And it sucks their brains out. Then, they’re your slave, Drake. What a discovery!”
“Yeah.” I said. I walked over to Luke. He stood up. I put my hand on the brain-suck lever, then on the brain-suck needle. I poked the tip of the needle with my index finger. “What a discovery.” I backed away from the Brain-Sucker. I put my hand up to my chin like I’d seen supervillains do on Saturday mornings when they were formulating a plan. “We could take over the world with this, Luke. I mean, Magellan. Magellan, We could brainwash everyone.”
***
Sir Francis Drake and Ferdinand Magellan were not Heroes like we thought. In reality, the two explorers/conquistadors were closer to villains. They raped, pillaged, stole, killed, enslaved and indoctrinated people to religion all in an effort to colonize and expand empires. To conquer the world just like Luke and I wanted to do with the Brain-Sucker.

Right when Luke said: “Yeah!” and agreed to my plan, I think we both realized this. We had realized the true nature of the characters we were playing that day. The villainous nature that all humans have. The drive to succeed at the cost of anyone or anything that gets in your way. The conquistadors are just one example of this, of course. In our fantasy plans for world domination via mass brain-sucking, Luke and I were channeling the drive to conquer that all the explorers we studied in 3rd grade represent. The fact that our first thought was to use the Brain-Sucker for “evil” is interesting, too. We didn’t just tap into conquistador villainy, but into the basic villainy that all humans have. I think most people, if given the opportunity to take over the world or save it, will chose to take it over. It’s just cooler, to.

***

“But, uh, can we come back another time?”
“Huh?” Said Luke.
“ I think I need to go back to your house,” I said.
“Why?”
“My feet are bleeding.”
Works Cited

Guillemard, Francis Henry Hill. The Life of Ferdinand Magellan, and the First Circumnavigation of the Globe. London: George Phillip & Son, 1890.

Kelsey, Harry. Sir Francis Drake: The Queen’s Pirate. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1998.

Koeller, David. “First Circumnavigation of the Globe by Magellan: 1519-1522”.Webchron. 2005. North Park University.        http://www.thenagain.info/WebChron/WestEurope/Magellan.html

He made Buffy. He made Firefly. He Made other other cool stuff including my favorite by him, the comic series Astonishing X-Men. He’s created in a bunch of stories in different genres, whether they be movies or comics or TV shows or even a web show: Dr. Horrible’s Sing Along Blog. And, I think all his work deals with heroes and villains.I think everything he’s worked on is about that. I mean, especially Buffy or Astonishing X-Men or Dr. Horrible or his work on Runaways. Those are straight-up superhero stories. But, I think Whedon’s work on Firefly and Dollhouse also explores heroes and villains, too.  I’ll probably post more about Whedon stuff especially Buffy The Vampire Slayer later. He’s always been a major inspiration to me for my own writing.

NPR, yeah! They…have cool news which isn’t all that corporate! Nice! And Fresh Air is a really good show for  interviews. I grew up with my parents listening to NPR all the time, and so Fresh Air has a special place in my heart because of that. One of the best shows they have. What I like most is when he addresses how sketchy and controversial the premise for his new show Dollhouse is, and how he works with that. There’s also a lot of singing in this interview. It’s fun kind of.

The interview’s ‘s a bit old, it aired February 12th, 2009. It’s about his new show, Dollhouse. But, about other stuff, too. If you don’t know about Joss Whedon at all, he’s cool. But, you know, don’t take my word for it. Have yourself a listen.